Ayatthaya

Ayatthaya was at one point the capital of the Thai kingdom. It is a beautiful island that has many ruins that are still fairly intact.

I arrived in Ayattaya early in the morning and rented a bicycle. The island is small enough that you can ride around and just run into the ruins. I rode around taking pictures of absolutely everything, while knowing what nothing was, since Ayatthaya had not been my original destination when I had gotten ready for the morning.

Ayatthaya was a nice change of pace from seeing other things in Thailand, as the value of visiting isn’t on temples or seeing Buddha. Both of which are very cool things but get to be a bit over kill after you have seen a ton of them.

The ruins are quite impressively maintained considering that the whole town had been burnt down when it was attacked by Burma. I really love living in a country with so much history that is still intact. America just doesn’t have much history like this.

While visiting my last ruin I was approached by an old man. I had a bad gut feeling about this guy so I quickly went into the temple on the premise. My thought process was that no one would do something bad in a temple, however I entered the temple and realized I had forgotten to put my sarong on to cover my legs. I was given a nasty look from a women who was praying, so back out I went. As I was putting my shoes back on this creepy man came way too close for comfort. I looked down and realized that he was exposing himself to me.

I quickly ran out of the ruins with my shoes half on and got onto my bike, quickly peddling away. After that experience I got myself a bowl of noodles, returned my bicycle, and took what felt like the most crowded train ride home.